


Memories Will Taunt You

by orphan_account



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-24
Updated: 2014-10-24
Packaged: 2018-02-22 09:30:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2502938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The three times he was dreaming and the one time he wasn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memories Will Taunt You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bluegothic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluegothic/gifts).



> based off of the prompt "nightmares" given to me by both tiff and rachel 
> 
> the title is from the song "haunt" by bastille

 

**_i._ **

She’s falling; her body is spiraling downward towards the ocean’s churning waters. His vision cannot stretch far enough, however, as he is forced to watch behind the locked glass doors. Her name slips from his lips, the familiar word growing louder with each cry out.

His hands are red as he hits against the door once more in hope that it will open. He hopes that his voice will carry, that it will reach out to someone on the plane. Fitz waits, thinking to himself that when the hatch was opened, the alarm should have sounded.

Still, no one comes.

Tears line his eyes now, his voice hoarse as the doors slide open. He’s fast. With shaking hands he attaches the parachute around his figure, mumbling to himself as he nears the edge. When he looks down, however, he does not see the figure of the falling girl.

He sees an expanse of endless ocean.

Fitz takes a step back, mouth just open as thoughts rush through his head. “Jemma’s alright,” he tells himself with another step back, “she knows what she’s doing. She always knows what’s she’s doing..”

He sits in the lab, waiting. He loses track of time as he sits alone, there is no one to see him and he is left with just his thoughts. He’s waiting for her to walk through the familiar lab doors with a smile on her face, buzzing on about the latest antiserum she has devised. As the hours sweep on, he begins to find it odd that no one has come to see him, to acknowledge that he is still there.

He leaves the lab shortly after eleven, climbing up the stairs and into the heart of the bus. The presence around him is eerie, the silence chilling at his shaken bones. “Hello,” he offers and no response is given. There is a faint buzzing sounding in his ears, but still, no one shows.

Fitz is truly alone.

 

He wakes in the middle of the night, sweat gathering across his forehead. The low sound of breathing is heard beside him. He doesn’t know when she joined him in his bunk, but cannot help but smile as he curls against her and drifts back into sleep. His sleep is made peaceful with Jemma at his side.

* * *

 

**_ii._ **

The second comes after she returns from the Hub following the discovery of Hydra breaking down the inner workings of S.H.I.E.L.D. He’s now asleep in his room at Providence, a distorted memory looping through his mind.

He remembers her being sent to the Hub, remembers having to say his goodbyes to the girl. Now he sits with anticipation creeping over him, waiting to hear word back, to hear some confirmation that she’s okay. She had been sent to work on Deathlok, Triplett being her only escort. Whether she knows what has happened or not is beyond him; he can only hope.

He finds himself standing before Garrett some odd hours later asking the simplest of questions, “Are you going to kill us?”

He’s not paying attention to Garrett’s words after the question, not until they’re directed back at him. Fitz feels the tears in his eyes, hot against his cheeks as he delivers the words to Garrett, “You’re going to suffer for what you’ve done, and I -” he stops himself briefly, collecting his words in hopes to deliver them with fleeting confidence, “I plan to be a very big part of that.”

He feels Garrett’s hand on his shoulder, hears the words of praise spoken to him. Fitz waits for something to happen and all too suddenly the order is given. He watches as the guns are raised, ready to shoot at his trembling form. He never feels a bullet contact his body.

When the first explosives go off his first instinct is to hide. He’s cowering now under a table, listening to the sounds of guns and booming voices. Fitz isn’t sure when it ends but soon finds himself looking up, gazing around at the demolished room. It’s when he hears her voice, followed by that of Triplett’s, that he is truly brought back to his senses.

He watches as they advance, watches the bullet intended for Triplett as it releases from the weapon. The last thing he remembers before he wakes is watching Jemma step in front of him, watching as the bullet knocks her down.

 

Fitz does not recall anything else; he’s already awake. The distorted memory leaves him breathing heavy and he sits himself upright. The clock beside him reads 3:48. With a wipe of his brow, he slides himself back into his bed, hoping the nightmare from before will evade him.

When he closes his eyes, the same scene begins to play again.

* * *

 

**_iii._ **

He’s sitting in silence in the pod at the bottom of the sea. She rests beside him, her low and even breathing keeping him calm as he takes a glance around his surroundings. The pod is disheveled, the fall into the water causing things to break and to spill within the interior. He ignores the pain in his arm as well as the pounding in his head; he focuses on her breathing.

He’s hungry, the low rumblings of his stomach distracting him from the calm he has tried to place himself in. He now keeps his eyes on Jemma worrying that, if he looks away for too long, when he looks back, she will be gone. He ignores the pangs of hunger rippling through his body, his mind now occupied with other thoughts.

Fitz finds himself drifting in and out of consciousness, the pain and the hunger slowly overtaking his body and his conscious mind. He gradually gives in, looking towards Jemma once more before he lets sleep take him.

He doesn’t know how long he has slept, but when he wakes the pod appears different. The space looks neater, like nothing was ever out of place. “Jemma, did you clean up?” He asks the question and no reply is given. Upon looking to his right, he sees empty space. He’s alone in the pod.

“Jemma?” His voice is louder this time, more anxious. He picks up on the newfound dampness of the pod, looking around to see the crack in the window. “Impossible,” he muses, trying to stand himself up. As he does so, he feels the water that has gathered at his feet, making its way into the rest of the pod. Once more he looks around, hoping to see her just as frightened as he appears to be. Fitz knows he can’t swim, knows he only has a matter of minutes before the entire pod is filled.

_And now I’ll never get to tell her.._

Something wakes him and he looks over to find Jemma off in the corner, a sad smile on her face, “You were talking in your sleep again, rambling on about ‘ _never getting to tell her_ ’. I’m sure your mum knows how much you love her, Fitz.”

He doesn’t correct her, but musters up a smile, “Right, my mum.”

* * *

 

**_iv._ **

She had told him that she was going to visit her mum and dad, that she didn’t know when she would be back. She told him this two months prior to where he is now, sitting alone in the lab with a hallucination of her.

Jemma doesn’t respond to him when he tries to call and when he asks Skye to help him, she says the same.

As the second month draws to a close his thoughts drift away from Jemma wanting to spend time with her family. He fears the worst; a brutal death that Coulson wishes to cover up comes to his mind first. When the time continues to drag on, however, he begins to worry that she was ignoring him, the team, for a reason. He fears that it’s because of him.

The thought makes him ill and as he sits down on his mattress that night with the hallucination of her at his side, he wishes he were dreaming. He wishes the one resting her hand on his shoulder wasn’t something he had imagined to keep him company, he wishes it were her.

He waits day in and day out for Coulson to break the news to him, and day in and day out he is disappointed. He wants nothing more than an answer; he wants something to put his nightmares to rest.

The silence is beginning to taunt him. 


End file.
